Host Kimai without installing anything
The stopwatch and the timesheet of a small outfit: by client, by project, with the hourly rate attached.
Starting at €8.99/month
Introduction
Kimai installed, updated and backed up by us, on a machine in France. You install nothing and configure no server: the application is online a few minutes after you order, under your own name.
The plan that suits it is App Confort at €8.99/month incl. VAT — 4 GB of memory. Kimai is a Symfony application backed by a MariaDB database: what costs memory is not the time entry itself but the reports and invoices, which load every line of a period before building the document. A year of entries for three people runs in 1 GB; the 4 GB are there for the day you ask for the yearly export.
Coming from Toggl or Clockify, the move is a CSV import: one row per entry, with the date, the duration, the client, the project and the activity. Kimai then exposes a documented REST API, which is what the third-party mobile apps and the browser extensions use to start the timer without opening the interface.
What Kimai does
Live timer, or entered afterwards
One button starts the counter from any screen and stops it when the task changes. You can also type the duration in the evening, having thought of nothing during the day.
Invoices built from the timesheet
Kimai turns the filtered entries into an invoice, using a DOCX, ODS or HTML template you adapt to your own letterhead, with a numbering scheme you choose.
A rate per client, per project or per person
The hourly rate is set at each level, with an internal cost rate distinct from the billed rate. You therefore see a project's margin, not only its turnover.
A documented REST API
Every entry, client and project can be read and written in JSON. That is the road taken by third-party mobile apps, browser extensions and your own dashboards.
Who uses it, and what for
A freelance developer billing by the hour
One timer per engagement, a different rate per client, and the end-of-month invoice produced from the same screen as the timesheet.
A tradesperson following their jobs
Each site becomes a project, each visit an activity. On delivery you compare what the quote assumed with what the job actually cost in hours.
A practice that rebills time spent
Three colleagues, three hourly rates, and a monthly export per client file to attach to the fee note.
An agency wondering where the time goes
An hours budget per project, an alert when the line is crossed, and the real split between production, meetings and rework.
A charity accounting for a grant
Volunteer and staff hours broken down by activity, exported as a table, ready to attach to the funder's file.
Hosted in France
In our own datacentre in Nouvelle-Aquitaine, which we operate ourselves. Your team's hours do not end up on an American service.
Frequently asked questions
Yes. Kimai reads a CSV with one row per entry: date, duration, client, project, activity, description. Both the Toggl and the Clockify export reduce to those columns once the headers are renamed. Clients and projects are created along the way if they do not exist yet.
No, and it does not claim to. It produces an invoice from the hours, with a template and a numbering scheme, but it keeps no bank reconciliation, no VAT return and no chart of accounts. Dolibarr or Akaunting take over on that ground.
Yes, that is the lockdown period: past the delay you set, earlier entries can no longer be edited except by an administrator. It is what makes an export defensible in front of a client or a funder.
App Confort, at €8.99/month incl. VAT. It provides 4 GB of memory where the application asks for 1 GB at minimum: the headroom serves the system, not the decor. You can change plan later without reinstalling.
Yes, they are part of the service. A self-hosted application left un-updated is a security risk, not a saving.